by Lynne Ewing
“Of course,” he answered. “I’m the one who sold the photos of you changing into a cat to the National Enquirer.” He smiled in a way that made Meri wince. “One of my better assignments,” he said.
“Why weren’t you afraid of Apep?” Meri asked, trying to turn the conversation away from what he must have seen that night when she transformed.
“You could say I have special protection,” he answered mysteriously.
“But why were you following me?” Meri asked.
“It’s not just you.” Stanley glanced around the table. “I’ve been watching the three of you since the day you were summoned, and now I’ve come to help you, before you destroy the world with your bumbling.”
“You’re our new mentor?” Sudi asked.
“We have so many questions,” Dalila added eagerly.
“I said I’ve come to help you, not guide you,” Stanley answered in a maliciously superior tone. “I pity anyone who is saddled with teaching the three of you the old ways,” he sniffed.
“Then how will you help us?” Dalila said, adopting a tone and posture that made him blink.
“I know how to stop Apep,” he said.
Meri sat down on the stool beside him. Dalila and Sudi drew closer.
“How do you know about Apep?” Sudi questioned.
“How do I know?” he whispered. For a moment, Meri thought he was going to cry. He sighed instead and rubbed his eyes.
“It started as an assignment,” he said at last. “I had to cover the opening of the Anubis Spa. A fluff piece, I thought, but then I discovered, too late, that the cult leaders are a group of determined women and men who have used ancient rites in order to gain terrifying power.”
“What do you mean, ‘too late’?” Dalila asked, and rubbed his hand to comfort him.
“Because I didn’t believe what I saw,” he replied. “Who would believe that the ancient conflict between good and evil continues today? I doubted my own eyes. Is everyone so blind? And then, when I did believe, the cult had already cast its curses upon me.”
He looked at Meri and sighed. “The three of you are nothing compared to the powers they have, and yet the Hour priests have called on you to do the impossible. What kind of misguided faith must they have?”
“We’ll learn what we need to know,” Dalila said firmly.
“Perhaps,” he answered. “I’ll pray it’s so.”
“Tell us about Apep,” Sudi interrupted. “You said you know how to stop Apep.”
“The cult summoned Apep to destroy the three of you,” he said.
“We know,” Meri answered.
“The demon was small at first,” Stanley continued, “and sent to kill you with its venom while you slept, but your cat Miwsher stopped it.”
“Miwsher fought Apep,” Meri said, remembering the storm, and how she had awakened to find a stray animal in her room.
“A lot of bad things happened that night,” Stanley said, with unfathomable misery in his voice. “Apep has his own will, and the cult has lost control over the demon. Now only Seth can stop Apep. The three of you must summon the ancient god of chaos and storm.”
“The cult worships Seth,” Dalila put in, “so why don’t they call him?”
Stanley frowned. “I’m surprised you don’t know such a simple thing,” he said. “Long ago, the goddess Isis cast a spell that still imprisons Seth in the chaos at the edge of creation. The god can’t enter this world in physical form unless he is summoned by the divine pharaohs. You three are the only ones who can release him from that spell and call him into our world.”
Meri looked at Dalila and Sudi, wondering if Stanley were telling them the truth.
“We’ll never do that.” Dalila folded her arms over her chest.
“To save the world from Apep,” Stanley said, “you must.”
“How do we know you’re telling us the truth?” Sudi asked.
“We won’t do it,” Meri said firmly.
“If that is your decision,” Stanley said, “then you alone will pay the consequences, and I’ve done my job.”
He placed the scroll under his arm, shifted his weight, and, using the table edge as a brace, stood. He started for the door, shuffling his feet, and tapped the wand on the floor.
Meri joined him at the top of the stairwell.
“Why did you visit my mother?” she asked. “You were with her the morning after the storm, and I heard you mention the Cult of Anubis when you got into the car with her.”
“I thought your mother could help me,” he said, starting down the steps. “Especially after I discovered the way she stole you out of Egypt.”
Meri bristled at his choice of words. “She adopted me,” she said, following him down the stairs.
“Hmph,” he snorted, taking another step. “‘Kidnapped’ is a better word.”
“What do you mean?” Meri asked.
Dalila and Sudi hurried down the steps so they could listen.
“I was the late-night visitor you were asking about that day after the storm,” he explained as he started across the second-floor landing.
“You were the one who knocked on the door?” Meri asked. “Then that means you stayed until morning talking to my mother.”
Stanley grinned. “When I mentioned the Cult of Anubis to her, she opened the door to make sure no one was outside listening.”
“Why would my mother be so cautious if she truly believes the cult is no more than a silly fad?” Meri asked as they walked down the last flight of stairs.
“Precisely,” he answered, stopping to catch his breath before he spoke again. “Why did she become so nervous? I assumed she knew something that could help me.”
Sudi and Dalila joined Meri and put comforting arms around her.
“Did she?” Meri asked at last.
Stanley started to answer, then stopped and wheezed. He labored to pull in air. His cheeks turned from red to an odd purplish color.
“Maybe you should sit down on the steps,” Dalila suggested. “You don’t look very well.”
He shook his head sharply and quickened his pace. “I’ve said too much,” he whispered. “That’s all.”
By the time he reached the front door, he had a strange desperation in his eyes.
“Help me,” he whispered as he fell on the stairs with a loud thump. He clutched the wand and papyrus tight against his chest.
Meri placed her hand on his forehead. The skin felt cold and wet.
He pushed her hand away.
“I think you’re having a heart attack,” Meri said.
“Don’t you know anything?” he asked. “Can’t you see what is happening to me? You’re supposed to use the magic of the gods to protect the world, and yet you don’t know?”
Sudi flipped open her cell phone. “I’ll call an ambulance.”
“Doctors can’t help me.” Stanley grabbed the phone from her and snapped it closed. “Since the beginning of time, the divine pharaoh has been charged with keeping the cosmic order and stopping the forces of chaos that threaten the world. As royal Descendants, you’re failing.”
Suddenly, Meri felt the presence of another force building around them, something cold and ancient and evil.
Stanley looked up, and his jagged breathing gave way to silence. His eyes widened as his arms and legs stretched and a guttural sound came from his throat.
Meri screamed and shielded her eyes.
When she looked again, Stanley had dissolved into a cloud of specks that fell like a powdering of dust on the floor.
Meri jumped back and batted the particles away from her, trying not to inhale them. She opened the door, stepped out onto the porch, and took a deep breath.
“Yuck,” Sudi squealed and ducked, rushing toward the door. She joined Meri outside.
Dalila groped through the dust until she was outside, too; then she leaned over the porch railing, coughing and crying.
“How could he just disappear?” Meri asked, trying to blot out the
image of Stanley vanishing.
“Even though we possess our own identity,” Dalila explained, “the gods can still use us to deliver messages. I think Seth was trying to use Stanley, but when Stanley fought to tell us what we needed to know, Seth called him back.”
“What did we need to know?” Meri asked. “That we’re failing?”
“No,” Dalila said. “Stanley managed to tell us that Isis had cast a spell imprisoning Seth. I doubt that Seth wanted Stanley to give us that information. And I think Stanley was trying to tell us more in spite of what was happening to him.”
When the particles had settled over the floor and stairs, Meri stepped back inside, grit crackling under her feet, and picked up the scroll and the wand.
“I can’t believe it,” Sudi said. “Just like that, Stanley’s gone.”
Dalila bent down and touched the grains. “I think this was more a show, to frighten us and convince us of Seth’s power. Stanley was probably transported to another location.”
“I hope so,” Meri said as she stepped outside again and rejoined Sudi and Dalila on the porch. “I hate to think that I was just walking over what’s left of Stanley.”
Sudi pointed to the seal on the papyrus. The hieroglyph for Seth, an erect tail and a pair of angular, raised ears, was imprinted on it. “Open it, and see what Stanley was trying to steal.”
Meri broke the seal, untied the string, and unrolled the scroll. The papyrus felt heavier and the fibers rough, different from the ones she’d touched before. She winced, wondering if the magic within was more powerful because the spells were used to battle the lord of chaos.
“Sexem a xesef a madret a,” Dalila intoned, reading the first spell aloud. Then she translated: “I gain power over and repulse the evil which is against me.”
“It looks like all the spells are ways to free oneself from Seth’s control,” Sudi said.
“Poor Stanley,” Meri whispered. “He was probably stealing this so he could get out from under Seth’s control.”
“Maybe Seth is the only answer,” Dalila said. “Wall paintings in tombs show him on the prow of the sun god’s barge, fighting Apep.”
“Seth stands for evil and destruction,” Sudi reminded her. “He’s too dangerous to call forth.”
“We’ll find the same incantation that Isis used to imprison Seth,” Dalila said confidently. “Then, after Seth has destroyed Apep, we’ll send him back to the chaos at the edge of the universe.”
“Are you sure?” Meri asked. “If Seth was controlling Stanley, then how can we trust anything that Stanley told us?”
“You’re holding a scroll that proves that Seth can be overpowered,” Sudi said.
“I know,” Meri said, hating the way her fingers quivered.
“Tomorrow night,” Dalila said firmly. “We’ll meet at the Tidal Basin and summon the god.”
“And if we do bring him here, will he really obey us and destroy Apep?” Meri asked.
“He’s destroyed Apep before,” Dalila answered.
“But so have we,” Meri said, feeling doubtful. “It feels so risky. We could end up with both Apep and Seth loose in our world.”
“The Book of Thoth gives us the power to command the ancient gods,” Dalila argued.
“It hasn’t helped us with Apep,” Meri countered.
“That’s the reason we need to summon Seth,” Sudi added.
“All right,” Meri said at last. “Tomorrow night.” But she didn’t feel convinced.
After a moment, Meri went back upstairs and extinguished the lamps. Then, downhearted, she started home, carrying her wand, and the papyrus that Stanley had tried to steal. She wished she had the answers.
Meri stepped into the front room. Her mother was sitting in the rocking chair near the fireplace. She didn’t look like a future president of the United States, wrapped in her purple afghan. She looked vulnerable and small, and in the firelight Meri saw a mix of fear and sadness on her face.
Meri dropped the papyrus in the umbrella stand and set her wand against the wall; then she walked across the room.
Her mother turned.
“Have you been crying?” Meri asked as she stepped toward the hearth and kissed her mother’s cheek.
“No, of course not,” her mother said and sniffled. “Have you ever seen me cry?”
Meri shook her head. But then her mother’s eyes brimmed with tears.
“What’s happened?” Meri asked.
A jangling sound made Meri look down. A pile of red, green, and blue beads was cupped in her mother’s hands. The semiprecious stones glinted in the firelight.
“I need to tell you the truth before it becomes headline news,” her mother said. “Sit down.”
Meri pulled a chair up next to her mother. She sat beside her and watched the fire. The embers pulsed within the pile of ash.
“I want to be president,” her mother began softly. “You know that better than anyone, but it’s another kind of power that has always interested me.”
“What other?” Meri asked.
“The power of spells and incantations,” her mother answered. “Does magic really exist?”
Meri held her breath, then blurted, “Why are you asking me?”
Her mother turned and took Meri’s hand. “Because ten years ago, when I saw you on the streets in Cairo, I stepped into another realm, or at least I think I did. I’m certain not everything that happened that day was my imagination.”
“I remember the afternoon,” Meri whispered. She had been holding Miwsher and meandering through the crowds outside the Cairo museum. Tourists had given her money in exchange for having their picture taken with her.
“You need to know everything that happened,” her mother went on, “so you’ll understand why I did what I did. When I walked past you—maybe it was the glint of sun—I don’t know, but I saw your birthmark, like a brilliant white light, beaming from you. I know I couldn’t really have seen it, because your hair was thick and long, like it is now.”
“You never told me this before,” Meri countered. “You always said you saw my little face and fell in love with me.”
Her mother looked away from her and stared into the fire. The shadows on her face stuttered in the firelight and made her look old.
“You have an odd birthmark on your scalp,” her mother said quietly. “It’s the sacred eye of Horus. Do you know what that is?”
Meri nodded.
“If I hadn’t seen the birthmark,” her mother confessed, “I probably would have walked past you.”
Meri looked down and blinked to keep the tears from her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” her mother said. “I was with a delegation, and we didn’t have time for such—”
She stopped, but Meri knew she had almost said, “nonsense.”
“That day I crossed a threshold into a world of magic,” her mother said, and gazed back into the fire. “As strange as it sounds, I sensed that evil forces were trying to kill both you and Miwsher. Maybe too much sun was giving me heatstroke. I don’t know, but I decided to adopt you. And it was more than a decision. I felt as if my entire life had pushed me to that moment. I told the Egyptian officials who were with me that if you were an orphan, then I wanted to adopt you and take you home with me.”
Her mother paused and wrapped the afghan more tightly around her shoulders and across her chest, even though the room was overheated.
“The translator asked you about your family,” her mother stopped and laughed, not aloud, but to herself, in a sad tone that sent a shiver through Meri. “You told her that Miwsher was your mother.”
Meri gasped. “Why haven’t you told me this before?”
Her mother ignored her question and continued, “The officials loved your story and called you a child of royal blood. Then one of the government men told me the story about the cat goddess Bastet mothering the pharaohs. They thought you were delightful.”
Meri had vague memories of her life in Cairo—the kindness of th
e neighborhood women, their warmth and love—but she had no memory of a home, a mother, or of Miwsher being more than her pet.
“It was a while before you spoke English, and even after you did, you insisted that Miwsher was your mother, that your cat turned into a woman.”
“I don’t remember saying that,” Meri said, feeling her chest tighten. “I would remember something so strange.”
“Sometimes at night, even now,” her mother went on. “I hear prowling around the house—sounds only a human can make by opening the refrigerator or the sliding glass door, and when I investigate, I always find Miwsher alone.”
As if the cat understood, she stretched and meowed, then sat and blinked at them.
“Yes,” her mother said to Miwsher. “I find you staring up at me with that smug little feline smile that probably exists only in my imagination, but still, late at night, I’ve wondered if you really do transform into the goddess Bastet.”
Then her mother laughed again, and her laughter sounded strange. “Can you imagine if the opposition party could hear me say that?” She shifted the beads to one hand, and a strand fell across her lap. That was the first Meri had noticed that the beads were strung together.
Her mother leaned closer. “I forged documents and brought you both home with me,” she whispered. “I broke the law.”
Meri took in a deep breath. Her mother’s reputation was impeccable. The opposition party was always trying to create a scandal or find something in her past, but without success. What would happen if they discovered her secret?
“By the time the plane landed in California, the magic was gone, and I couldn’t believe what I had done,” her mother went on, “but I adored you. I had never been as happy as I was when you were in my arms.”
Her mother began rocking. The curved slats of the rocker creaked noisily.
“I don’t believe it was a coincidence that brought us together that day,” her mother said, staring up at the ceiling. “I think the universe was weaving our lives together, purposefully, and with a plan.”
Meri felt a sudden urge to tell her mother the truth, but she held back. Her heartbeat quickened, and she waited to hear what else her mother had to say.